5 Books for Your Weekend

From one of the Middle East’s most popular novelists, comes this tumultuous tale set in 1950s Cairo. From political intrigue and corruption under the reign of King Farouk to the rampant racism and retribution of British colonial rule, The Automobile Club of Egypt is a rollicking and fast-moving story of a family swept up by social unrest and change in Egypt following the Second World War.

The latest psychological thriller from Canadian crime novelist Giles Blune explores the fine line between romantic love and all-consuming obsession in this unlikely maelstrom of passion between a Benedictine monk and a troubled young author who visits an upstate New York monastery on a writer’s retreat.

Set in Renaissance France, The Rival Queens reads more like a novel than a biography. Catherine de’ Medici, who dominated European affairs for thirty years, was a ruthless powerbroker, while her youngest daughter Marguerite, the glamorous “Queen Margot,” was a passionate free spirit — and one of the few people her mother could not control. The book, which includes such celebrated figures as Elizabeth I, Mary, Queen of Scots, and Nostradamus, brings to life the treacherous court politics of the 16th century and what has been called the great age of queens.

A cold case involving the unsolved murder of a young girl is reopened by the very man initially suspected of committing the crime. Is it simply a case of wanting to clear his name once and for all or something more sinister? In the first book of a new series from bestselling author Michael Koryta, Markus Novak, an investigator for a Florida-based Death Row defence firm, travels to the scene of the crime, a rural Indiana farm, where he discovers a deadly and ancient secret buried deep beneath the ground.

Best known for her Italian crime series featuring Detective Sandro Cellini, in this stand-alone thriller, British author Christobel Kent chronicles the difficulty of overcoming tragedy and not being defined by your past – especially when those nearest and dearest may not be who they seem. A page-turner that may have you taking a closer look at your own nearest and dearest.